Are you SURE that's a vagina?

For those of you who are teaching your kids the generic "girls have a vagina" lesson, you ARE teaching them that the proper term for the entire outer package is vulva and not vagina, right? I mean, you know that the words are not synonymous, don't you?  

Just in case, let me give you a quick anatomy lesson. 

Vagina and vulva are not the same thing.  They are not interchangeable physiological terms.

The vagina is part of the inner workings, not the outer.


I asked this question on a social networking forum and got a variety of responses including this one:

"My child is too young to know the technical terms for her body parts." (Ignore the fact that the pet name we have created for her genitalia is four syllables long and she's already made up a song about it.)

And this one:
"Vulva is just a gross word."   (Vulva is not a gross word.  "MOIST" is a gross word.)  
  
And also this one: "It all means the same thing."

(To say that it's all the same thing is as inaccurate as saying that your hand is a finger and your finger is a hand and that's just plain silly.)

You know what this post needs?  Venn Diagrams!  (I know they look like crazy cartoon breasts.  Shut up.)

It's true that all rectangles are parallelograms, but not all parallelograms are rectangles.  
Likewise, all vulvae contain vaginas (or rather, the vaginal opening), but all vaginas don't contain the vulvae.

Yes, there is a difference and the difference is huge.  Vulva = clitoris, labia (2 sets) urethra, vaginal opening.  Vagina = the canal that leads from the vaginal opening to the cervix.   

Do you need another diagram?  Okay, here:  

So if you choose to shave your vulva, that's cool.  Get creative. Have fun with it.  However, if you choose to shave your vagina, it's not going to end well.  Don't use the good towels. 


Now, I know there will be someone who will get all worked up about this. Calm down. You can teach your kids whatever you want.  Don't sweat it because some stranger on the internet told you that it's the wrong word.   You're not breaking any law of child rearing.  No member of the Vulva Brigade will show up and ticket you for referring to your lady bits as your bajingo and hand you some reading material about the inaccurately named Vagina Monologues. I'm not going to take away your euphemisms.  Hell, euphemisms are fun!  Tell them it's a Harvey Wallbanger or a FlufferNutter if you like.   


I'm just saying that technically, it's incorrect.  


To recap:

The vulva is the correct term for the outside parts as a collective whole.

The vagina is the correct term for the "collective hole".  

What's your favorite euphemism for the VULVA?

  

  

She did it again!

Our winter holidays started out as normally as they could have, considering who we are.  We had our annual dinner and gift exchange at the in-laws' after church on Christmas Eve, which is always a great time; dinner was wonderful, conversation was even better and there was wine.  Yay, MOSCATO!

It seems like every holiday, something happens that I simply MUST write about because...(because I'm an obsessive over-sharing maniac) because I'm a blogger.  Sharing the mundane stuff like this is my life, my passion. 

This year, Christmas was full of blog-worthy stuffs to relay to you, gentle reader.  Sadly, the majority of it was lost on Christmas morning because that is when tragedy struck.

I'm getting ahead of myself (again).


A Holiday On Hold
The girls each got a new pair of warm, fuzzy, stay-at-home-socks in their Christmas stockings from jolly old Saint Nicholas.  They love All Things Soft and Fluffy, so of course they put them on immediately.   This is important.  Trust me.

After the last present was opened, the plan was for the kids and The Man to clean up the mess from Unwrapaganza while I started a lovely Christmas breakfast for everyone. That plan was rudely interrupted when I heard Lily yell something that derailed our lazy Christmas morning and sent it careening off into a ditch:

"MOM!  SAM GOT A SPLINTER!!"

Sam ran through the dining room in the slippery wood-collecting-socks that evil bastard brought for her and when she skidded to a stop, yes indeed, Sam...got a splinter.  

If you are a regular reader of my family's tales, you will remember that this has happened before.  Many of you are already aware that I have a child who is a magnet for splinters and when she gets one, she doesn't mess around with the tiny stuff that can be gotten out with a simple tweezers or the aid of a needle.  No way, no how!  When Samantha does it, she goes all out - sliding across the hard-wood floors, yards at a stretch, to see just how much flooring she can strip off in one go.  "FIND ALL THE SPLINTERS!" she cries.  She also gets these enormous planks embedded so deeply and so securely into her skin that it requires medical attention to retrieve them.  THIS was one of those times. 

Yeah, that's not gonna cut it.

After last year's ordeal (which I will link again, because it's just that incredible), we knew not to waste any time waiting for an army of white corpuscles to stop what they were doing and meander over to the foreign body that had taken refuge in the sole of her foot, for she was likely to lose the entire appendage by the time they cooperated enough to force the splinter out.  It was time to get dressed and head to the Convenient Care Clinic.  *nodding*  No Post-Gift Exchange Nap for you, Johnny-Boy.  No waking up to the smell of maple bacon crisping in the oven.  Coats on, everybody!  Let's move out!

The Waiting is the hardest part

We got to the Convenient Care Clinic, checked Samantha in and began to wait.

And wait...


And wait...

Three bored children, two parents, one large plank of wood didn't make for a very merry Christmas.  At least we were all together...irritated, but together.

Soon...(what am I saying? Strike that...) After waiting roughly the same amount of time it takes to cook a 20 pound turkey, we were shown to a room where a nurse got the skinny on Sam's allergies (or lack thereof), and a brief run-down of how she came to have a hunk of petrified oak jammed inside her person.  When she had enough information, we were then told to follow her to the next room and you'll never guess what happened there!

Aw, you guessed it: more waiting.


So we snapped a picture of the adorable six-year-old's foot to kill some time:

*pffft* Well, that took all of thirty seconds.  What do we do now?

As if sensing my boredom...irritability...and general impatience that this was taking SO LONG, the more mobile members of Sam's entourage began to play a nifty little game called "TOUCH EVERYTHING!!!"  Fun stuff, that game.   It's guaranteed to make your mother go abso-fricking-lutely insane in a matter of minutes. 

Just when we were sure they had forgotten about us (I have no idea how that was possible, as we are noisy and were cordoned off from the rest of the office by only a curtain), in walked the doctor who would surely save Sam from the stabbing pain of Pinocchio Syndrome and us from the agonizing wait. 

He took one look at it and said, sounding much like Gary Cole in Office Space: "Mm...yeah, I think we're going to have to go ahead and, uh...numb that."  Well, gee, Bill, do you think so?  I mean, look at it.  There's nothing to grab on to.  Any fool can see that we're going to have to go in after it and one of us may not come out alive.  If you want to try that on a frightened six-year-old without Novocaine, be my guest.  Just use your Jedi mind trick and we'll be on our way.  Moron.

Instead of using The Force, we (Dr. Bill and I) opted to put a topical numbing agent on it so the needle wouldn't be as traumatizing to my six-year-old.  Add fifteen more minutes of waiting, this time with Mommy sporting a pair of purple surgical gloves to apply some jelly textured numb-making stuffs to Sam's foot with "gentle PRESSURE" (*sigh*  Poor Sam), follow that with Dr. Bill shooting Novocaine into the entry point, and we were ready to begin. ("BEGIN?!" WTH?!)   He made a few futile attempts to grab the splinter, but found he was unable to get a good grip on it with the smallest hemostat he had, so after all this time, Good Doctor Nimble Fingers couldn't get the splinter out and he sent us to the hospital emergency room.
Damn.  This rivaled last year's splinterectomy debacle in a big, sad way.

At the ER
I am happy to report that after another hour of waiting , an ultrasound on Samantha's foot, two near-fistfights between the Tired and the Hungry, and about a thousand mobile status updates to Facebook, Sam was once again, splinter free.   HALLELUJAH!  

Holy crap!

By this time, we were an hour late for dinner at my mother's house, so we gathered up Sam, the splinter and the rest of our clan and headed for Nana and Poppa's house, stopping ever-so-briefly at home to grab the presents and the makings of my contribution to our meal (thank God I didn't have to make anything more complex than green bean casserole).

We'll call this next part "Splinter At Large"
When we finally got to my parents' house, Sam immediately wanted to show the splinter to her cousins.  Now, after the morning's ordeal, we didn't expect her to actually take the splinter OUT  to show it off and we sure as hell didn't expect the splinter to make a break for it, but that's what happened.  When she opened the container, it fell.   It fell near(?)...under(?)...IN(?)...the cushions of the couch.  It was lost.  Oh, damn.  That's at least a hundred dollar splinter (and probably more, as we have yet to receive the bill from the ER).  We wanted to keep it and put it in our shadow box of "Stuff that got stuck in our kids".  Shoot.  Now it's gone.  Bummer.

Was Lost But Now Am Found
I went to my parent's house the day after Christmas to have coffee and in a last-ditch effort, searched the couch cushions once more, to see if I could find that blasted splinter.  I picked up a cushion and clapped it once and the splinter fell onto the couch.
*THUD*
Me:  No. Freaking. Way.  I FOUND IT!  QUICK!  DAD, GET THE BOTTLE!  GET THE BOTTLE!  
My Father: Where is it?
Me:  It's still in my purse!
My Father:  Don't move!  I'm on it!

And so we wrangled that splinter into the bottle and closed it up tight. REALLY TIGHT.

That oughta hold it.

 Once again, the world is safe for Samantha's tender feet.  Sort of. 


We're getting carpet this spring.

And the Truth Shall Set You Free (Even Though You Smell Like Pee).

Fade in: My living room. Picture me cuddling with my seven year old and my nine year old daughters. Enter husband, wearing serious face.

"Honey, you'll want to come see this."

Me: *sigh*

I followed him to the kitchen, where my husband, soul-mate, sugar daddy said, "That's pee on the floor," as he made a grand, sweeping gesture with his hand. Yes, indeedily, it certainly was pee, and a good portion of the kitchen floor and a step-stool were covered with it. The dog hasn't hosed down a room like that in some time and quite frankly, the husband hasn't either. I knew who the culprit was by the fact that the dog wasn't the only pantless one in the kitchen. I looked at the guilty three-year-old Samantha and said, "Sam, did you pee on the floor?" She said, "Yes, but I said I was sorry." This surprised me (marking her territory on the linoleum, not her apology) and I asked her why she would do that. Sam looked up from cleaning her mess like a miniature Cinderella and said, "Well, I had to GO." ...Um...Yeah. Okay, that served me right for asking a three-year-old to explain herself.

Fast forward five minutes.

Back to the kitchen to refill my water. Seeing the monster of a dog, I give him a pat on the head as I pass. His head is damp. Wha...? *double take* "How did your head get...Oh, no." I smelled his furry melon and sure enough, that unmistakeable odor reached my nose. Lovely. Just lovely.

"SAM?!" *walks quickly to the living room where Sam sits watching t.v. with her sisters*

"Why is Brinkley's head wet?"

"He got it wet," said Sam.

"Yes, I know, but HOW did he get it wet, Samantha?"

Child makes up story quicker than you can blink..."He put his head in his water bowl."

I said, "No, his head is wet on TOP. How did that happen?"

Oldest sister Madison pipes up, "Sam, if you tell the truth you won't get in trouble." (Yes! Good thinking, Madison. That's how we'll get it out of her! I was just about to get the folding chair, rubber hose and a VERY bright light.)

Sam confesses. "Yes, I pee-peed on the doggy's head." (Mommy hides behind a pillow, giggling silently, thinking "Remember, you're her mother. Laugh later.")

"WHY did you pee on the dog's head?"

Sam, very matter-of-fact, shrugs her shoulders, explaining, "Because it was kinda FUNNY."

Note: Sam has apologized to the dog and promised not to pee on anyone ever again. Madison and I have recovered from our fits of laughter out of Sam's earshot and the floor and dog are once again, clean and pee-free. Thanks for your support.

NO means "NO" - A Lesson In Self-Control

Pizza seduces me. It tempts me with its slightly browned cheese and its rich and nommable tomato sauce. It whispers, "Eat me" and without hesitation I do. I can't help myself.

I was having a(nother) piece of pizza at dinner tonight, despite the annoying little voice that said,

"No, Erika. Put that back. You don't want another slice."

I ignored that voice and went for the second helping:

"Add more crushed red pepper! Mama-Mia, I like-a the spicy pizza!"

*shake-a shake-a shak-AAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHH!!! MYEYESITBURNSMYEYESOWOWOWOWOW!!!*

Yes. In my fevered frenzy of seasoning, the smallest particles of (really) crushed red pepper caught the wind of the ceiling fan and...I peppered myself.

Ow.

After about ten minutes of flushing my very sore, very red eyes under the bathroom faucet and cursing the employees of McCormick Spices and their offspring and their offspring's offspring and anyone who knew their offspring's offspring, I spent another ten minutes enduring watery eyes and an uncontrollably runny nose. I now understand what it is that pepper spray will do to an assailant.

I have learned my lesson. If I insist on forcing myself on the pizza, I MUST NOT ARM THE PIZZA. (Clearly, I was asking for it.) Better yet, I should steer clear of that Italian-American tease and never think of it again.

"NO" means "NO". I get that now.

I guess I didn't really want that piece of pizza after all. Now that I think about it, it probably had a parasite in its pepperoni.

(Ah-HA! Did you see what I did there? I rejected the pizza, it didn't reject me. I dumped it first, therefore I win. Humph!)

*quietly* Slut.